Trilithons
by SelDear
Summary: In the dark of the night, Evil will find her...
1. The Stones

**Trilithons – The Stones**

In the purple dusk, with the stone trilithons seeming to loom larger than their actual height, it was natural for Sam to feel like someone was watching her. At least, that was what she told herself.

Over her head, the sunset was staining the sky shades of gold and pink, peach and lilac, rosy hues fading as the sun descended behind the distant hills of another planet.

And then the stars came out.

Bright points of white and blue, pink and gold in the night sky, these stars didn't twinkle to the naked eye, as did the stars visible from Earth. One of the survey team had stated that it was possible P2W-746 had a thinner atmosphere than Earth – although they had no way to test that theory – only the clear view of the heavens above.

"Impressive, huh?" The voice that emerged from the darkness didn't startle her – she'd faintly heard the sounds of his passage long before he'd stepped out of the brush and crossed the plain to where the circle of stones stood.

"It's beautiful." The stars had always beckoned her as a child – other planets, other worlds. As a child, the only way to reach them had been to become an astronaut – to get into NASA and fly to the moon. She'd studied towards that goal at college, joined the Air Force for the chance to get into space. And then she'd joined the SGC. Her work on SG-1 satisfied her childhood dream a lot better than NASA could ever have done. "I take it Daniel and Teal'c decided against stargazing?"

He snorted, "Yeah. Daniel's hard at work again. Teal'c was firmly in _kel no reem_ last time I checked. Probably more to escape Daniel's enthusiasm than anything else." The Colonel grimaced, visible even in the twilight. "I said good-night, but I don't know if he even heard me leave."

Sam smiled, thinking of her team-mate involved in his translation with the kind of intensity that was uniquely Daniel.

"It's been a while when he got to translate something simply because he was interested in it."

"Yeah. No 'fate of the world' kind of stuff. Makes for a nice change after everything..." He trailed off as if only just realising what he'd said. "Well...it's a nice planet, anyway. And it's good to be out of the SGC."

She was amused by the way he managed to change the topic and he knew it. With a grimace and a deep breath, he clapped his hands together too loudly in the quiet. "Right. So are you ready to do some astronomy, Carter?"

He'd set up the telescope earlier that day, pestering his team with good-natured cheerfulness as they brought the parts along and he made calculations on how to set it up. Once Sam had finished her analysis of the low-level EM-field the trilithions were emitting, she'd helped him with the calculations, while Teal'c and Daniel debated the translation of the inscriptions on the stones around them.

SG-1 would be here for four days, reporting back to the SGC every day with their findings.

It was to be a 'quiet' mission. No allies, no enemies, just some time for them to get over the events of the last few missions and sort themselves out again. "The down time you have when you're not having down time," Colonel O'Neill had joked as they changed in the locker room. 

"What did you want to look at, sir?"

"Well, I thought we'd start with the various moonrises, go investigating that northern asteroid belt, and then check out the nebula over there. There's a cluster that looks pretty promising..."

She listened to his voice rather than his words, the drawling tones easy on her ears as he described several of the stellar sights that SG-9 had catalogued in the initial survey of the planet. Earmarked for later exploration and use as a possible beta site, the main concern had been the 'stonehenge' nestling on a plain to the north of the foothills.

Goa'uld inscriptions covered the inner face of each standing stone – all forty-seven of them. This had been a major cause of concern to the initial planetary survey team, although further exploration had failed to bring up any sign of Goa'uld occupancy, recent or otherwise. There were no naquadah deposits that their technology could detect, and no signs of civilisation apart from the 'stonehenge'. A natural cave system in the northern foothills appeared to have been used by wild animals – none of which the planetary survey team had actually seen – but not by humans of any historical period.

Once it was clear that there was no immediate likelihood of Goa'uld occupation of this world, the survey team had settled down to detail what they could of the alien stonehenge.

While it was fairly clear that the writing on the monoliths was Goa'uld, it seemed that it was some ancient dialect, long forgotten among Goa'uld and Jaffa. Daniel had taken one look at the report and practically demanded SG-1 be assigned to the follow-up survey. The Colonel had treated their colleague's enthusiasm with amused indulgence up until he read the report about the stargazing possibilities - and then Sam and Teal'c had _two enthused and determined team-mates intent on dragging them to P2W-746._

Teal'c had borne the enthusiasm with good grace and, although he maintained his usual stoicism, Sam could see that the prospect of a 'quiet mission' was infecting him as surely as it was propelling the Colonel and Daniel along. If she were truthful with herself, it would be nice to take it easy for a change.

And her shoulder ached. Landing on it had done her body no favours – unfortunately she hadn't had much of a choice. Just as she hadn't had much of a choice in leaving the Ambassador behind on the Volian homeworld. It was the Ambassador or Earth.

She'd chosen Earth.

For better or worse, she'd chosen a world full of people over one man – and while her pragmatism said she'd made the right choice, the feelings of guilt were unavoidable.

In the dusk, the Colonel's voice droned on without a break and Sam shifted a little, still not listening to what he was saying. For 'a man of few words' he could be a lot like Daniel sometimes. "...and if you look carefully, you'll see me doing the Macarena naked..."

_That_ jerked Sam out of her reverie. "Wha...?" Her gaze met the Colonel's exasperated expression.

"Oh, so you _were listening, Carter?" One corner of his mouth quirked a little and she flushed. "So on which planet were your thoughts? Apart from the one where I'm doing the maca..."_

She interrupted him before he could continue. There were some thoughts it was better _not to entertain about this man. "I was just...thinking..."_

"And this is new...how?" One look at her expression told him that this wasn't a laughing matter. "About?" He sat down beside her on the stone. Not too close, of course.

"Ambassador Faxon."

"Oh." He glanced away and grimaced, "Carter…"

She knew what was going to come from him. Some nice polite platitude about how she'd done the right thing and how it was for the good of Earth. Sam didn't need to hear that kind of reassurance – she'd had it from everyone else so far. What she needed was belief – and there was nobody who could give her that but herself.

"Sir, I know what you're going to say. I made the best decision – I know that. I just don't think I made the _right one…" And there was more in that statement. More, which she wasn't going to say, because his motto was well known: _No-one gets left behind_. And she had left the Ambassador behind, after all._

His reassurance in the gateroom that she'd "done good" was cold comfort. Sure, she'd done good. She'd managed to scuttle the Aschenn attempt to destroy humanity and left an innocent man behind to deal with the fallout.

And there would have been a _lot of fallout. _

_Great job, Sam._

She didn't want platitudes and he probably knew that. He'd probably been in the same tough-choice position before when there was nothing he could do to help the situation and only one way to defuse it – the hard way. He knew how it felt, he knew the burdens, he knew the deal. _Deal with your issues and get on with the job; you have a world to save – again._

"Actually," he said, after a moment, "I was going to say that it doesn't get easier as your career goes on. And it shouldn't, either."

His words startled her – but not as much as his subsequent action. In a rare display of affection and understanding, he took her hand and squeezed it briefly and firmly, warm fingers closing around her cold ones.

It was the first personal contact they'd made in a long time.

"Sir?"

She couldn't see his eyes, it was too dark for that, but she could imagine the expression in them: intent and surprisingly gentle – the expression she heard in the tone of his voice. "We both know there are no easy choices in our line of work, Carter. We make the best decision with the facts we have – and sometimes those facts are enough to make the right decision - too often they're not. And we live with it on our consciences." He sighed, faintly and softly in the night. "Is it easy? No. It's expedience, plain and sordid, and it's no fun. But…" his hand squeezed her fingers lightly, "…when you have people around you who are willing to support you – to back your actions – that makes the burden lighter."

The encouragement wasn't anything she'd expected from him and maybe he sensed her surprise, because he snorted. "Listen to me, I sound like Daniel."

Sam smiled, recalling her thoughts from earlier that evening, "That's not entirely a bad thing, sir."

"Depends whether he's in marshmallow mode or lecture mode."

She considered saying something; she really did. But in the end, discretion won out over teasing and she let it pass. In spite of their personal and professional differences, each man had influenced the other more than either of them ever thought they did.

"Look, Carter...you did a good job in a bad situation. Really." The hand around hers squeezed again and she accepted the touch. Even if it didn't banish all her regrets and feelings of guilt, it helped. He let her hand go, not quite reluctantly, but certainly not eagerly. "You're a good officer, Carter. I'm glad to have you under my command – and more grateful than you'll ever know for the times you've pulled my butt out of hot water." A pause. "And I am _so not good at this kind of pep-talk."_

Her lips curved at his deprecating tone. "You're doing fine. Thanks, sir."

"You're welcome, Carter. Now," he continued, standing up and brushing himself off. "According to Captain Vang's notes, moonrise should be happening in..." he checked his watch, "a few minutes."

Sam watched him as he fussed and fiddled with the telescope, a faint smile on her face. The Colonel was a private man and always had been, but sometimes – just sometimes – he opened up just a hint to her, or to Daniel, or to Teal'c...

He had a good sense of timing about it anyway.

"Now one of the things about this planet is the unusual orbit, Carter, did you read through Vang's notes?"

"Briefly, sir."

"Only briefly?"

"I was too busy reading Lieutenant McMahon's notes about the composition of the stones."

"Well, if you'd bothered to find out just little bit more about this planet, you'd know..."

Sam grinned as her CO chided her and proceeded to explain about the astronomical significance of the moonrise. It was a nice change to be listening to him 'babble' at her.

Nice.

*

_He watched her from the shadows, yearning over the way the moonlight touched her face._

_Exquisite, as she had always been. Her laughter clear, like fresh water. Her eyes, pale points of brilliance in the evening. Her movements, imbued with the grace of any sidhe woman although she was no more than human._

_The man with her had no comprehension of her beauty. Instead of admiring her, he was too busy staring up at the heavens, without any realisation of the woman who sat beside him, listening to his voice, sometimes smiling at his words._

_It had been long - too long._

_Time here dragged like a stone through the dust. So many years alone and lonely. So many years without her smile or her laughter, her body against him in the night, her voice speaking to him of her day._

_And she was here now._

*

"So...what's the stuff say?"

Daniel glanced up at Jack from the notes he'd scribbled last night. A few feet away, Teal'c was video recording another of the trilithons with solemn care. In the centre of the two circles of stone, Sam was sitting on a large flat slab with a clipboard on her lap and the end of her pen in her mouth. "Uh...a lot of things, actually."

"A lot of _what things, Daniel?" Jack was in an, 'I need to know and I need to know _now_,' mood. Wonderful._

"Well, the Goa'uld were here once. Or some of them were," Daniel indicated the stones around them. "They came here to enact an execution of one of their own. I think there was a kind of...coalition of Goa'uld rulers in several systems. They had an agreement with each other and one of them broke it. The punishment was execution and confiscation of his lands – and they brought him here to die."

"And the Stonehenge?"

"I guess it was a kind of marking spot for one of their own."

"I thought the Goa'uld didn't go for the whole 'honouring the fallen comrades' thing," Jack remarked.

"They didn't. I guess. At least we've never seen any evidence of it before. But this was definitely a place of execution for the Goa'uld in question."

"And did 'the Goa'uld in question' have a name?"

"Uh...yes."

"And his name was...?"

"Well, I assume he had a name, Jack, because it would have been fairly stupid if he didn't."

"You just haven't found it, right?"

"Er...no."

Jack rolled his eyes. "So...the Goa'uld don't believe in putting up a sign saying 'Here lies Evil System Lord X' to let people know where everything stands? 

"No, Jack."

Jack peered at the markings inscribed into the stone while Daniel watched in amusement. "So how long do you think...?"

"Oh, we'll need at least a few more days. Teal'c is finishing off the video now. When we go back, I'll be..." Daniel watched as Jack looked sharply at him in question and changed what he'd been about to say, "...getting the linguists in the lab to look over it." He tried not to sound resigned but sometimes it was hard to leave these things to other people – especially when Daniel knew he was the expert in Goa'uld. The _human_ expert in Goa'uld. Teal'c had forgotten more Goa'uld than Daniel had ever known.

"Good boy."

"I'm not a pet dog, you know, Jack."

"I know."

"So don't treat me like one."

"I'm not."

"You are."

"Right now, you're acting more like a sulky kid than a pet dog."

"Well, would you rather I drooled all over your crotch?"

_That_ stopped them both dead and they went very red. Jack looked like Daniel had just grown glowing eyes and a ribbon device and Daniel suspected he had an, 'I _really_ didn't mean that the way it sounded' expression on his face. _Sometimes I wish my mouth would consult my brain before coming out with such gems._

It was laughter that broke their frozen embarrassment at Daniel's _faux pas_. Soft sniggers of amusement came from where Sam sat, her clipboard now clutched to her chest as her shoulders shook.

"It wasn't _that funny, Carter."_

She wasn't even able to stop laughing to answer him.

"It was extremely amusing, O'Neill." Teal'c stated from across the circle of stones. Although his back was turned to his team-mates, the smirk was quite audible in his voice and Jack glanced over at Daniel with an expression that quite clearly said, _Why the hell couldn't you have picked something else to say?_

Daniel shrugged, annoyed with himself and doubly annoyed at Jack for having started the whole conversation off. "Glad we could be of service."

Sam hiccupped and tried to stop herself from laughing to no avail. She caught Jack's eye, snorted with laughter, hiccupped once and laughed some more.

Jack glared from her to Teal'c to Daniel and stalked off. "I'm going to look over Captain Vang's notes. Again."

Teal'c continued to video the writing on the stones and Daniel glanced down at his notes again. _Me and my big mouth..._

Finally, Sam's laughter wound down - although the hiccups continued. Wiping her eyes free of tears, she addressed Daniel. "You should have seen your faces." _Hiccup! "It was priceless." Daniel just gave her a sour look as she put the clipboard down and came to look over his shoulder. "How much have you translated so far?"_

He leapt at the chance to change the topic. "Only a fraction of the first stone and bits and pieces of the others."

She nodded. "Anything we need to be worried about?"

There were times when he'd hated her and Jack and Teal'c for having a mindset so different from his own - for not seeing things the way he saw them. It made him uncomfortably separate from them. But time and again, they'd shown him how necessary their kind of thinking was for survival - and he'd shown them how necessary his kind of thinking was for more than just survival. In the end, the two balanced out.

"Not that I can see." He made a face. "I'd ask how much trouble a Goa'uld supposedly dead for a thousand years could be, but..."

"Marduk," Sam said as he trailed off.

"Marduk," he agreed. That mission had cost not only the lives of three Russian soldiers but a great deal of goodwill between the American and Russian military. Daniel most definitely did not envy the next person who'd have to deal with the Russians. "Still, if there was a Goa'uld to worry about around here, then I doubt this place would be so deserted." He waved a hand at the green valley around them. "It's pretty peaceful."

"It's relaxing," Sam murmured. She glanced out towards the hills and Daniel slung an arm around her shoulder and gave her a quick squeeze. She'd had it rough the last couple of missions - from the destruction of Tollana and the death of Narim, to the sabotage of the Aschenn treaty and having to leave the Ambassador behind.

She looked at him, startled by the gesture of affection. While they were close, none of SG-1 were the openly affectionate kind. But he was pleased that she leaned into the hug for a moment. Until he realised Teal'c was videoing them.

"Teal'c!"

The video camera didn't move an inch. "Yes, Daniel Jackson?" Damn the man for being able to keep a straight face! 

"Stop that!"

One corner of Teal'c's mouth turned up from what was visible of his face behind the video camera. "If you say so, Daniel Jackson." He went back to videoing the stone plinths as Sam shook her head smiling and ducked out from under his arm to return to her clipboard on the slab. Daniel hoped it was just her automatic withdrawal from emotional displays - although he suspected she'd been getting better since her relationship with Jacob improved - and not any distaste for being 'linked' with him.

He turned back to the stone he'd been studying before Jack interrupted him and tried to decipher more of the text. The reason the translation was going so slowly was because this writing was a kind of 'high Goa'uld' language. Daniel had seen it before but the chances to study it had been few and far between. And with Jack insisting that he needed Daniel out in the field rather than in the research labs, it seemed like Daniel would be leaving the translations to someone else. Again.

Sometimes being a member of SG-1 sucked.

*

Continued in Trilithons Part Two - Aengus


	2. Aengus

**Trilithons – Aengus**

Major Carter lifted her head and cocked it, listening for something.

"Carter?" O'Neill asked, suddenly alert.

She glanced at him, then back out at the night. "I keep thinking I hear wailing," she said. "Very faintly when the wind gusts."

The campsite went silent as they tried to hear anything out of the ordinary.

There was the rustle of the wind in the leaves and the muted sounds of nocturnal creatures. A faint chirping of crickets and the distant croak of a frog in the distant river.

But nothing else.

"I can't hear anything," Daniel Jackson remarked at length.

O'Neill shrugged. "Got me there, Carter. Teal'c?"

"I sense nothing, Major Carter," Teal'c informed her regretfully.

She frowned a little and glanced out towards the darkness. Then she shook herself and gave a little smile. "I think I need some sleep."

"Don't forget, you're on the second watch."

The smile tugged one corner of her mouth sideways. "Don't forget to wake me, sir."

And she rose and slipped into the tent she shared with Daniel Jackson. There was the sound of the zipper being done up and then the rustling of her bedroll before...silence.

"Maybe I should take the second watch," Daniel Jackson offered. "You could just let her sleep and wake me up instead..."

O'Neill looked across the campfire at him. "Who was it who was Mr. Wrong-Side-Of-The-Bed this morning?"

"You."

O'Neill snorted. "Teal'c?"

"O'Neill is correct, Daniel Jackson. You were indeed grumpy this morning." Daniel Jackson had not been congenial until they reached the site when his enthusiasm for the translation of the stones had replaced his bad humour. He had been of a more positive frame of mind for the rest of the day – much to his team-mates' relief.

The site, while of considerable concern to the SGC, was fascinating to Teal'c in the same manner that it was fascinating to Daniel Jackson. This place had evidently been visited by the Goa'uld, yet not populated by them in spite of the presence of a Stargate on the planet.

He was still alert for possible signs of Goa'uld – if this planet had been known to them, then there was no guarantee that they wouldn't come back at some stage. But it was a pleasant change not to have to be as wary as usual. While a warrior was always ready for the fight, a warrior also appreciated the times when fighting was not necessary – and learned to enjoy them to the fullest extent.

"Daniel, just do your translations and go to sleep. Teal'c is on first watch, I'm on last. We'll be fine."

"Are you sure?"

"Would I tell you if I wasn't?"

"You might."

"Guys," came a voice from the tent in tones of dry weariness, "If you're going to bicker, could you go back to the circle and do it? Some of us are trying to sleep."

"Bossy, Carter," O'Neill said, but without any heat in his voice. 

"Sorry, Sam..." Daniel Jackson said over his shoulder before he turned back to the fire and lowered his voice. "Okay. But I'll do a watch tomorrow night and Sam gets to sleep."

"Hey, if you're going to be a sucker for punishment, don't let me stop you," O'Neill told him dryly. "And speaking of suckers for punishment, I'm going to turn in. My old bones aren't doing so well with the chill of this place."

A snort emitted from Daniel Jackson, "Your 'old bones' can beat the heck out of me six days a week, Jack. And the only reason it's not seven days a week is because on the seventh you're too tired to be bothered."

O'Neill reached out and clapped a hand on his team-mate's shoulder. "Aren't you the lucky one then?"

"Lucky," Daniel Jackson echoed, dryly. "Sure."

With a grunt, O'Neill hauled himself to his feet. "Be good guys, and don't stay up too late, Daniel. No point in being off-watch if you don't use it to your advantage."

"Do I get grounded if I don't get home before curfew?" It appeared that Daniel Jackson was in a good humour tonight.

"Don't push your luck, Daniel." O'Neill was in a good humour also. "'Night, guys." A minute later, they heard the rustle as he climbed into his tent.

Then it was just the silence of the hills and the crackle of the fire.

Daniel Jackson glanced Teal'c's way and shrugged good-naturedly before turning back to the notes he had resting on his lap and beginning his translations again.

Teal'c considered the night and the brilliance of the stars in the sky above them – a gleaming tapestry of multicoloured diamonds set in midnight blue velvet. He had been to the planets of many stars in his life as the First Prime of Apophis, seen many places and people. But there had never been the time or the space to contemplate the stars in the skies above him. He had never been encouraged to see the stars above him – simply because the Goa'uld didn't want their soldiers considering anything beyond the needs and conquest of their god.

His time on SG-1 had certainly changed that. O'Neill's interest in amateur astronomy had taught Teal'c to look at the stars. Daniel Jackson's view of life had introduced Teal'c to new cultures and new ways of doing things. Major Carter's knowledge and background in astrophysics had given Teal'c insight into how the pieces of the universe fit together – and his place in the midst of it.

Although he still had to keep alert for anything which could harm his friends, Teal'c welcomed the vigil of taking watch on many levels. It gave him time outside of _kel no reem to simply be still and appreciate the beauty and wonder of the world around him. It provided him with a measure of solitude without loneliness; and gave him a warm feeling of being trusted._

Even after five years spent with his friends, there were times when Teal'c found himself amazed that these people trusted him. They had been through many things together, many battles against the Goa'uld and other enemies; and yet sometimes Teal'c felt the weight of his sins pressing down upon him. Not the sins for which he was reviled among the Goa'uld and the Jaffa, but the sins which he had committed against innocents in the name of his god.

Through Daniel Jackson and O'Neill, he had learned of the histories of Earth and the military regimes under which they had operated. He'd read the books on the Holocaust and seen the way the scientists and military leaders of Nazi Germany had been hunted down by such organisations as the United Nations. He had read up on the war tribunals and seen the punishments enacted on others who had destroyed the lives of innocents.

Teal'c had done many things of which he was not proud. He would live with the guilt of his actions on his conscience. His work on SG-1 was part of his atonement for the evil things he had done in his history – but he was well aware that he could never fully repay in good what he had done in evil.

And yet his friends trusted him, time and again. They understood that his loyalty was to them as individuals, not to the SGC as an organisation, nor even to Earth as a planet. They knew the other loyalties that bound him in honour and pride, and they accepted them – even if they didn't always agree with his actions.

Trust was a delicate and precious thing – and so Teal'c treasured the delicacy of his friends' faith and belief in him in actions both large and small.

Across from him, Daniel Jackson yawned in the midst of his translation. Technically, Teal'c should have been helping Daniel Jackson with the translation; however his team-mate had expressed a wish to attempt the translation without Teal'c's help. There were other pages of translation that Teal'c had been working through, but Daniel Jackson had wished to try these ones himself. 

"I believe O'Neill was correct, Daniel Jackson. You should take your rest."

His team-mate gave him a look of reproof and shuffled some papers. "Teal'c, while you were Apophis' First Prime, did you ever hear about 'The Seven'?"

Teal'c searched back through his memory. "I did not, Daniel Jackson. Were they the Goa'uld who ruled this system?"

"I don't think it was this system, Teal'c. But I think it might have been a nearby system - a set of planets under a collective Goa'uld rule. They probably weren't big enough or powerful enough to be System Lords themselves, but they didn't want to serve another System Lord. So they formed their own...coalition, I guess." He looked down at the paper and frowned. "Were the Goa'uld in the habit of making...I don't know...sagas to the System Lords?"

Teal'c cast through his memories of both Apophis' court and what little he recalled of Cronus' court. "There have been some System Lords who wish to have songs of their exploits sung before their allies. Apophis was not one of them. Those who took on the personas of gods from Earth cultures rich in an oral tradition may have had these sagas, but neither Apophis nor his allies did."

"Uh-huh." Daniel Jackson scribbled a few notes in the margin of the page. "Tha-a-a-a-anks..." The yawn was impressively large. He cocked a wry smile at Teal'c. "I think I'll get some sleep."

"That would seem to be a wise decision, Daniel Jackson." Teal'c smiled slightly. "Sleep well."

"I will."

The tent was unzipped, then zipped up. There was the rustle of sleeping bags...then silence.

Teal'c sat back and attuned his senses to the sounds of the night so if there was any sound out of the ordinary, he would pick it up.

He heard nothing but the wind. 

*

_She approached the edge of the circle, curious yet hesitant._

_Exquisite._

_"Who are you?"_

_Yes, she'd always been one to ask questions. The legends claimed her the most beautiful woman ever born - as if that were the sum and total of her charms. _

_"A friend."_

_Her eyes stared back at him, judging him with the wariness he recalled. She'd never trusted easily, but her trust, once given, was invaluable._

_"A friend?" Her eyes travelled over his form, taking stock of him. It was a warriors move, a fighter's careful reading of the situation, strengths and weaknesses. She was born of Fionn, indeed. "What are you doing here?"_

_"I have been here a long time." Waiting for her._

_A frown touched her features, but she studied the stones instead, stepping forwards - almost to the edge of the circle, yet not quite. One hand lifted, hovered over the stone. "It's warm," she wondered, turning her gaze to him. "They're not warm during the day. I wonder if they store energy like batteries…"_

_He couldn't help a smile at her fascination with the stones, even as he stepped closer to the edge of the circle. "I could show you what they do." He was careful to keep the eagerness out of his voice. He didn't want to frighten her away._

_She hesitated. Interest warred with caution._

_Gently, he increased the intensity of his attraction. The others had called it 'glamour' and thought it unfair that he should have been gifted thus. And they had resented it and plotted to overthrow him - with one of his own vassals ambitious and complicit._

_But he was indeed the son of his mother._

_"Why are you here?" She glanced around, the sharp edges of her curiosity dulled by his glamour but still interested._

_Interested in him._

_"They accused me of a crime not mine and imprisoned me here."_

_"Who?" Then she frowned briefly as if a cloud of memory had drifted across the sky of her mind. "The others?"_

_For a moment, he did not know how she had known of the others. Then he remembered her companion attempting to translate the stones._

_"The others." He smiled in confirmation._

_"Where are they now?"_

_"Far away," he told her, assured of that fact. His exile had been long and lonely and he had craved companionship all that time. He had craved her presence._

_"Who are you?"_

_The druids claimed that the knowledge of a name granted power. They were right and they were wrong. "They called me the Mac Og. But you will call me Aengus. And you are Etain."_

_She frowned, the glamour not yet strong enough to hold her from protest. "My name is not Etain."_

_He smiled gently at her rebuke. "It is now."_

· 

Exactly which planet Carter was on was questionable, but Jack knew it wasn't the one he, Teal'c, and Daniel were on. He had to repeat his question before he got any kind of response.

"Sorry, what, sir?" She blinked, almost like someone waking up.

"Is everything okay, Major?" Jack was feeling more indulgent than irritated with her vagueness, but he _did need her to have her eyes and ears open. If they'd been on an unknown planet, then he would have been sharper - a __lot sharper - with her. "You've been out of it all morning." He regarded her from his log and waited for the flood of revelation, which he knew perfectly well would never come. She wasn't that type. She _especially_ wasn't that type when there was an audience – even an audience of three of her closest friends._

"Uh... Nothing, sir."

"You sure, Carter? You've been zoning in and out lately. If there's a problem..." He left it hanging, hoping she'd take him up on it – or take the hint. If this kind of behaviour went on for much longer, he was gonna have to chew her out. Not something that he enjoyed doing under any circumstances, but especially given that she was an excellent soldier most of the time. 

"There's no problem, sir."

He hadn't really expected any other answer from her. But hey, he'd hoped that after their little chat of the other night she'd be a bit more willing to shoot straight with him. Not that she ever shot crooked, only that she was good at hiding behind masks. And so was he.

"Okay, then." He went back to his work on the astronomical calculations for the planet's sun and moons. He'd recruited her help for a few of them, but was slowly working through most of them himself. It gave him something to do other than sit around twiddling his thumbs and waiting for the sun to set and the stars to come out.

Based on the notes Captain Vang had taken during SG-9's stay here, and comparing it to the notes he'd taken since they'd arrived here, Jack had some calculations to work out so he could actually chart some of the more interesting points in the night sky instead of just looking at them.

Everyone on his team seemed happy enough with the stuff they had to do. It was nice to get away from the SGC on a 'milk-run' mission once in a while – although if they got another 'milk run' after this, then Jack might start getting offended.

Teal'c was slowly transcribing out the images taken by the video camera in the last couple of days. They went onto sheets of paper that Daniel was then translating and pondering over. And she was leaning back on her rolled up bedroll with a pen dangling from her mouth as she wrote out notes and theories regarding the energy readings they'd found in the stones.

At least the heads-up seemed to have worked. She was focusing on her work, not staring out into space. And if her hand paused occasionally in writing her notes, Jack pretended not to notice and got on with his own calculations and reading. 

He'd read up on books about ancient astronomical techniques before they came here. Some had been from Daniel's library, others had been slipped from the archaeological department, still others had been taken from Jack's own book collection about astronomy - although his books and journals were more about modern techniques and discoveries than ancient ones.

Daniel had been unmerciful in his teasing regarding Jack's 'sudden' interest in artefacts - but truthfully, Jack had already known a lot of it before he started reading. The reading was mostly to refresh his memory.

There was a certain mysticism to the way ancient peoples had observed the rising and setting of the sun over the years, then developed huge stone calendars to measure the seasonal changes in a more concrete manner than checking whether the sun was out or whether there was a blizzard outside.

The cultures that had developed such measures of time usually involved rituals related to the sun - rising, setting, equinoxes and solstices. In particular, the Celtic people had placed great importance on the sun points in the calendar - although Jack personally doubted that the druids had been half of what was attributed to them with the whole new age thing coming along.

"Ah!" Daniel's exclamation interrupted his thoughts - interrupted all their thoughts. Without looking up, he continued, "I think I've found a name for this Goa'uld. They called him the Mac Og."

Jack frowned. "What kind of a name is 'the Mac Og'?"

"It's almost a title, Jack. 'Mac' means 'son of', and 'Og' is another name for the Dagda."

"And who exactly was this Dagda?"

"Uh...kind of the Zeus of the Irish pantheon, I guess. He was considered one of the greater gods and fathered a lot of children on a lot of different women."

Jack had a very limited idea of who Zeus was – mythology was Daniel's specialty, not his! But he understood the phrase 'fathered a lot of children on a lot of different women' well enough. "So, he got around?"

The phrase irked Daniel in its 'modernnness' as Jack had known it would. "Something like that."

"And this is one of his kids? Does he go by any _other_ name apart from 'Son of Og'?"

"Aengus."

The two men turned to look at their team-mate, who'd come out of her daze. "What?"

"Aengus," she said, as if her non-sequitur was self-evident. "The Mac Og is also known as Aengus."

Jack blinked. "Didn't know you took an interest in Irish mythology, Carter."

Her embarrassment was palpable - and confusing. "Well, I don't, sir. I just...remember hearing it somewhere..."

"Aengus...Aengus..." Daniel glanced over at Teal'c. "No recollection of a Goa'uld by that name?"

"If he was one of these seven Goa'uld, Daniel Jackson, then it is unlikely that I would ever have heard of him. Apophis was unaware of their presence in this system."

"It's familiar...hang on..." Daniel 'spaced out' for a minute while Jack looked at Carter and Teal'c and shrugged his shoulders. "Aengus was the Irish god of love and youth. A male equivalent of Hathor, I guess."

"And exactly why did they imprison him?"

The pages of notes were flipped through, while Daniel muttered to himself. "I know I saw it here somewhere...somewhere... A-ha!" His brows went up, then descended down again. "Um, Teal'c, I don't know this word..." He clambered up to show Teal'c the page he'd been studying. "The one before it indicates that he stole something..." 

Teal'c only took a second to identify the word. "It is the term for 'personal slave', Daniel Jackson."

"Personal slave..." Daniel started scribbling that down on the piece of paper. "Thanks, Teal'c. Okay...well, then, he stole a personal slave from one of his fellow Goa'uld Lords." One page of the pad was flipped over, "The Goa'uld in question took offence and tried to go to war, but...the others stopped him. I think. Or they channelled their efforts into something else."

Jack arched his brows. "Something else?"

"A rebellion against this Goa'uld. I think...I think they took one of his minor Goa'uld and supported him to overthrow him."

"And they buried him here."

"I guess so."

That worried Jack. The last thing they needed was a Goa'uld about the town. "You _guess so?"_

"I haven't translated it all, yet. But it does say that these stones contain the one known as the Mac Og, condemned for his theft of his brother's human servant..." Daniel squinted. "Etain." He frowned, deep in thought. "There are Irish legends about Aengus and Etain on Earth." 

Jack had little interest in legends; he was more worried about the possible presence of a Goa'uld on the planet than any kind of mythology that Daniel might be into right now. "Daniel, I think that finding out if they left a Goa'uld wandering around this planet is a greater priority than trying to remember old legends. Right?"

"I thought we'd confirmed that there was no sign of Goa'uld presence."

"We did," Jack was undaunted by the question. Rule number one about leading a team: don't let their questions get to you. "But I'd like to be sure that our...Magog is dead and buried here, not just 'left here to rot'."

"They wouldn't have just left him here, Jack." 

"Why...?" Jack suddenly realised why these 'seven' wouldn't have just left Magog to run around the planet – the presence of the Stargate. He raised a hand to head off his team reminding him what he'd briefly forgotten. "Never mind. So if the Goa'uld knew there was a Stargate on this planet, why'd they leave him here at all? Why not pick another planet?"

"Maybe they wanted him available for some reason." Daniel shrugged, unbothered.

"Here lies Magog. He wasn't a nice guy and we killed him and buried him here. You really don't want to follow in his footsteps." Jack caught the edge of Carter's brief smile and Daniel's glare at his levity. Daniel really needed to develop a sense of humour. "What?"

"You are most likely correct, O'Neill." Teal'c's pronouncement surprised them with his leap into the conversation. "The Goa'uld are vindictive to the point of gloating. They would not have passed up the chance to put his grave in a place where they could bring their vassals and show them the price of rebellion."

"But wasn't this guy his own mini System-Lord or something?"

"It is more than possible that they merely wished to bring him down for reasons of their own. Were he powerful and inclined to do his own thing then the other Goa'uld may have preferred someone more compliant in their power structure."

Carter had sat through all this, silent and contemplative. She was phasing out again, and Jack snapped his fingers at her. "Carter!"

She didn't move, didn't start, but her eyes immediately flickered to his. "Yes, sir?"

"You still with us?"

One corner of her mouth quirked. "Yes, sir."

"Don't have anything to add?"

She seemed to gather herself. "Well, the level of energy the stones were emitting this morning was significantly less than they were emitting last night. I..." she frowned and stared off into space. "I think they're batteries."

"Batteries for what?" Daniel asked immediately.

Her gaze stayed unfocused. "I don't know. Maybe... Osiris and Isis were kept in stasis jars – maybe what these Goa'uld did was the same kind of thing? It only took a tiny charge in the stasis jar to keep Isis frozen..."

"So...the circle is basically a giant stasis jar, holding a probably-still-live Goa'uld who's been more or less 'flash frozen'?" The back of Jack's neck started to crawl. Okay, so it had been crawling some from the moment they realised that this thing was a burial ground for a dead Goa'uld. Jack had just supposed the thing was dead – hopefully with the equivalent of a stake in its heart. To discover it was only sleeping the enchanted sleep of a hundred years was not a happy prospect.

"I wonder if we could dig him up and take him back to Earth," Daniel mused. He looked defensively back at his team-mates all of whom had turned to look at him with varying degrees of disbelief and revulsion. "He probably has a lot of information about the Goa'uld – if we could get him to hand it over..."

"Daniel, when have we ever known a Goa'uld to just hand something over?" Sometimes Jack simply didn't understand his team-mate. The only good Goa'uld was a dead one. Sure, the info would be nice, but they already had one Goa'uld running around on Earth – they didn't need a second one, even one under their control.

"Um...no. Unless they wanted something from us. Or were setting a trap."

"Exactly." Jack sighed and glanced around at the stones hemming them in. "So what else does all the rest of it," he waved a hand at the ancient carvings, "Tell us about Magog, Daniel?"

Daniel didn't even look up from his notes. "I'm still translating, Jack."

"Well, hurry up."

"I would if you'd stop interrupting me."

Jack caught Carter's eye and decided against prodding Daniel any further. While it was fun to prod his team-mate from time to time, too much could become too much.

Admittedly, Daniel bore the brunt of it since he provided all kinds of opportunities where Carter and Teal'c were out of the question. It wasn't fair to prod Carter since she technically couldn't hit back without crossing the lines of insubordination. Teal'c, on the other hand, was too solemn to make fun of. Or at least, he made you _feel he was too solemn to make fun of._

Jack sighed and went back to his calculations.

"Sir, if the purpose of the stones was to set up a power-source for keeping this Goa'uld in stasis, then it may be that they just used the form of the circles without giving it any meaning."

"Huh?" It wasn't that he didn't understand any of the words she'd just said; he understood them all. It was just that in the context in which she'd used them, he couldn't make head or tail of what she meant.

"Sir, if the stones were set up as a battery by the Goa'uld, then they wouldn't have bothered with setting up the circle as the circles on Earth were set up – to mark the sun and moonrises at certain times of the year."

"Oh, I wouldn't say that, Sam," Daniel added from his log, "Putting the monolith together seems like too much work for the Goa'uld to be bothered with. It's more likely that some other race initially put up the circle of stones and the Goa'uld just used the energy-containing properties of the stone for their purposes."

"And all the writing on the stones?"

"Well, I imagine they carved that. Seeing as it's all about the Goa'uld imprisoned there." Daniel's tone of voice was about as dry as he could make it.

"Goa'uld graffiti?" Jack glanced at her to see if she smiled. Her mouth twitched slightly.

"If you want to call it that."

"So what it comes down to is that I still have to do these equations?"

"That sounds about right, Jack."

"Thanks, Daniel."

"No charge."

Jack rolled his eyes and went back to work.

An hour and several conversations later, Jack got up and stretched his legs. He surreptitiously massaged his butt since it had gone numb about thirty minutes ago, and stretched his arms a little. The calculations were done and the results gave him fairly good idea of where the planet presently was in the solar cycle. He'd check his calculations against tomorrow's sunrise and see how they did. And if Carter thought it necessary, she could look them over and see if he'd forgotten to transpose a ten into the next column.

The late afternoon sun was just above the western hills. In less than half an hour, it would vanish from view of the campsite and the shadows would slink low-bellied into the valley to make it their haven until the sun rose again.

Above them, the sky was darkening, taking on rosier, more vivid hues, and the clouds that had threatened earlier had fled to the horizon, leaving the arc of the heavens clear and the skies naked to his perusal.

It was all good.

Jack clapped his hands together, startling his team-mates from their reveries.  "Well, sky's clear. Who's coming stargazing tonight?"

"I shall, O'Neill."

"Good man, Teal'c. Daniel?"

"Uh...well...um...okay." He could tell Daniel wanted to stick with his translations. But however reluctant the acceptance was, at least it _was_ an acceptance instead of a dismissal. 

"Excellent. Carter?"

"Yes, sir."

Even better. It would be the first time he'd managed to get them all to the stones to see the stars. Admittedly, it would cut down on his personal viewing time, but it would be worth it to show them the sights of the night sky. And he rarely got to show off his astronomical knowledge to his team-mates.

He clapped his hands together. "Great! Who's on dinner tonight?"

"You are, sir."

"Can't be."

"You are." Daniel looked positively gleeful.

"You assured Major Carter that it would be your turn this evening, O'Neill." Even Teal'c was smiling faintly at the corner he was in.

_Drat_.

Jack looked from face to face, hoping for a reprieve. He found none. With a deep sigh, he went over to their supplies and began rummaging through the packs for the next load of MREs.

Oh well, at least he'd finally gotten _everyone stargazing tonight._

*

Continued in Trilithons Part Three - Etain


	3. Etain

**Trilithons - Etain**

"Tell me about Aengus and Etain."

Daniel turned in surprise.

Sam had been silent all evening, staring up at the stars, not really interested in looking through the telescope, sitting apart from the others.

When Teal'c got up to take his turn at the telescope, Daniel sat down next to her against the large stone, but said nothing. She was in a peculiar mood tonight, pensive and reluctant to say much. He'd almost asked her if everything was okay, but decided that it was better to remain silent while she worked things out in her mind. Sam was a private person – they all were.

So he sat beside her to let her know that if she wanted to talk, he was there, but if she just wanted to think things through, then he'd be there when she came out of it.

She'd come out of it sooner than he'd expected.

"I don't remember that much about the Celtic legends you know."

"So tell me what you remember."

It was odd for Sam to be interested in myths and legends. Her memory for them was about as good as Daniel's was for the convoluted astronomy explanations Jack had been giving them all night.

He cast his mind back to the books he'd read over the years, trying to find the shards and fragments of stories and weld them into a cohesive whole.

"The Mac Og - Aengus - was probably a bit like the Celtic version of the Greek Hercules. He was the illegitimate son of one of the central gods - the Dagda - and, well, did his share of great deeds. He grew up alongside the god Midir and the two were like brothers. Aengus even won Midir the hand of the fairest maiden in all Ireland."

"Etain."

"Etain," he agreed. "There was a competition...uh, I keep thinking it was chariot-racing, but I don't think that was it. Anyway, Aengus won her for Midir."

"Like a prize."

"That _is the way women tend to get depicted in histories and legends, Sam."_

"Doesn't mean I have to like it."

He let that pass, grinned, and kept going. "Midir already had a wife, however, and she wasn't pleased about the rival for her husband's affections, so she started plotting to drive Etain out of the household."

"As you do when your husband brings his girlfriend into the house."

Daniel rolled his eyes in mild exasperation. He _hated_ being interrupted when he was telling as story or legend. It was why Jack got his goat so easily. "Sam, do you mind not doing that?"

Now it was her turn to grin, "Okay. So, the wife kicked Etain out and she went to Aengus."

"Something like that. I think Aengus took her in and 'gave her all due honour'. Which reads between the lines as sleeping with her."

"And they lived happily ever after?"

"Actually, no. I think Etain left Aengus when Midir's wife pursued her again. Like I said at the start, it's been a while since I read this set of legends. We haven't exactly come across a lot of Celtic gods and goddesses among the Goa'uld pantheon." Daniel made a mental note to dig out the books and articles on Celtic discoveries and Celtic mythologies and glanced over at Sam. "What's with the sudden curiosity?"

"Sudden curiosity?"

"About the Celtic mythology." Daniel didn't say it, but usually Sam was only interested in such things as they related to military strategy - which, he had to admit, wasn't much.

"It's...interesting."

"You never used to say that before when you yawned through my presentations."

Her abashed expression was felt rather than seen in the dim starlight, and Daniel grinned. Archaeology, history, and mythologies weren't everyone's cup of tea - but he loved it. He  loved researching into the tiny bits and pieces of long-ago lives and fitting those pieces together to get an idea of what life had been like back then.

He'd gotten used to the idea that his team-mates didn't always want to hear what he had to say about his discipline - it wasn't always necessary that they know the background to the Goa'uld.

"I'll let you in on a secret, though," Daniel leaned over a little. "I sometimes tune out when you're explaining stuff, too."

She chuckled. "So we're even?"

"Even Stevens," he assured her.

They sat in silence for a little while longer. She stared up at the stars and Daniel stared over at her.

He'd been self-involved lately, too busy with his own concerns to notice any of hers. They'd both withdrawn a lot from each other in the last eighteen months, slowly and gradually. It was part and parcel of the things they'd gone through over the years, their way of dealing with things too painful to face head-on.

Sha're's death and first locating then losing Shifu had thrown Daniel's life into emotional disarray. Three years of his life vanished – Sha're and everything she'd been to him, everything he'd done to try to get her back, all slipping into the maw of time.

And Sam had been coping with her own stresses of the time. First the three months where she worked day and night on getting Jack home from Edora, then having to kill Martouf. An ever-thickening shield between her and her team-mates, hardly perceptible but felt nevertheless.

So there'd been little time and less space spent with each other. And although Daniel didn't know how she felt about it, he missed their interactions. Of course, lately, it had been too easy to just let things slide, putting no particular energy into the maintenance of any of his relationships with his team-mates.

Maybe sometime in the future something would startle him out of his lethargy and his isolation and cause him to reach out to his friends. Right now, he was almost content being arm's length and uninvolved. Almost.

"I was just wondering if the legends came first or if the Goa'uld made the legends." Her sudden renewal of their conversation confused him for a moment. Then he made the connection and began pondering her question.

"We've always assumed that the legends came first and the Goa'uld followed up on them..."

"But something like this, where the story depicted in his...well...epitaph matches the legends we have on Earth..." She frowned briefly. "How did the legends get to Earth anyway? Wasn't Earth cut off from the Goa'uld long before the Irish gods came into being?"

His mouth opened to answer her, then shut again. "I don't know. Although there are tales in the Celtic histories that speak about great voyages that some of their ancestors took to far-off places. So...maybe these Goa'uld periodically returned to Earth and took slaves with them or something?"

"We'll have to get General Hammond to get some people to check out the stone circles in Ireland and Scotland," she added, continuing on in her train of thought while Daniel wrestled with his own. "While I doubt any of them are holding a Goa'uld – glowing stones and suchlike are a little too noticeable – it would be worth looking into them. If they were set up by the Goa'uld or someone else...are there any ideas on who raised them?"

Daniel snorted. "Ideas? Heaps. Actual knowledge of who raised them? None. Actually, the ideas brought out by the branch of archaeo-astronomy is about as well-respected in the wider academic community as the idea that aliens built the pyramids." He gave a self-deprecating snort.

"More aliens?"

"It depends who you're talking to."

"How about Dr. 'Spooky' Jackson?"

Laughing, he pulled up some grass and tossed it at her. "Stop that."

She retaliated by plucking her own fistfuls of the turf and hurling them at him – with, he had to admit, superior accuracy. In this case, Daniel Jackson most certainly did not throw like a girl – 'the girl' threw much better than he!

They snickered their way through the impromptu grass-tussle until Jack noticed what they were doing.

"Hey guys..." They laughed simultaneously and grinned like the children his tone of voice implied they were.

Jack muttered something to the effect of, "Can't take them anywhere," while Teal'c regarded them, regarded Jack, and turned back to star gazing.

Daniel rested back against the stone, brushing grass out of his hair and off his jacket. That had been fun. It seemed like such a long time since he'd had fun, both having nobody to laugh with and feeling uninclined to laughter.

In another moment of affection, similar to that which he'd experienced yesterday, Daniel held his hand out to her. After a moment's hesitation, she took it. And he squeezed her fingers in brief, warm pressure for a shared moment of resonance.

Maybe they were both a little guilty of shutting each other out.

And to let her back in wouldn't be such a terrible thing. It would just take a little more effort – and some willingness on both their parts.

Daniel was willing to give it a go.

*

_Her companions were what he had expected. The kind of men who would be attracted to her – perhaps not as lovers, but as strength was attracted to strength._

_The tall one with skin the colour rich earth was Jaffa. Of Apophis, which was unusual. Apophis had been far too involved in his own power struggles against Ra to concern himself with them. Perhaps things had changed? And if so, what role had Etain in his plans?_

_The grey-haired one was born of Fionn as was she, but if she and the Jaffa served Apophis, then this one would serve no master; he was too independent to be any god's servant. That one would question all things and rebel were he not handled right._

_The third one was gifted. There had always been a few among his servants who could read or write – a chosen few. None had ever managed to master the written form of the Old Tongue – the language of the Gods. Yet this one had. His translations were slow and somewhat inept, but the skill inherent in learning the Old Tongue..._

_Could they be turned through her? Her opinion and her presence was valued by them, and she, in return, valued their presence else she had not ventured here with them._

_He craved company and loyalty, and while his 'glamourie' had not worked on men so much as women, there were some who had succumbed. The gifted one might, but the Fionn-born one would not and the Jaffa were immune – they were only commanded by pride, honour and fear. Those two would have to be swayed on the strength of Etain and the gifted one. If they could not be swayed, then they would have to be destroyed._

_Aengus bore no rivals to his power._

*

Sam stared at the man standing in the circle of stones before her.

She'd dreamed this last night. She was sure of it.

She was awake now.

Exactly how she'd come to be here, she wasn't sure. One minute, she'd been keeping watch at the camp. Then, in a blur, she'd found herself at the Stones staring into the midst of them where he stood.

Aengus.

He was tall – about as tall as Colonel O'Neill, pale-skinned, dark haired and dark-eyed. Intense.

Around him, the innermost circle of stones glowed faintly. The soft blue light they shed crawled over the ground inside the circle, but didn't reach more than a couple of feet outside it. Between each stone hummed a field that crackled with latent energy as she stepped closer to it.

Daniel had been right. Aengus was a prisoner of the circle, not kept in stasis but confined within the stones.

"I am glad you are here, Etain."

"I am not Etain." The protest was automatic. She was Sam Carter. _Major_ Sam Carter, not a slave over whom two Goa'uld had quarrelled.

But the quirk of his smile worried her. "You will come to answer to it." Sam almost shuddered. In spite of the harmonic undertones there was something compelling about his voice. "I have waited a long time for you to come here."

Curiosity rose to the surface at his words. Dimly, a part of her mind questioned his insistence that she was 'Etain', but the curiosity was foremost. "How long?"

He shrugged, "The summer has come and gone many thousands of times since they brought me here."

"Your host hasn't aged."

"These stones that keep me within also renew my body daily." His face twisted into anger, "It was their way of mocking me - they took my love and the trappings of my life away, imprisoned me here and refused me even death."

They'd never met a Goa'uld before who longed for death. But then, she reflected, they'd never met a Goa'uld who'd been imprisoned alone for thousands of years. Even Marduk had managed to possess the creature that consumed his host and eventually escape his sarcophagus. 

"How come we can pass in and out of the stones but you can't?"

"It is keyed to my body chemistry. All others can pass through it - but not I."

Sam blinked. "Wow." It was an ingenious way of trapping someone. The scientist in her wondered how it was done. "So, I could walk in there and walk out."

"If you wished." He studied her and Sam watched him. The invitation was clear, but Sam was more than aware that Aengus was a Goa'uld. She could feel the naquadah in him - the prickle of awareness in his presence. And you never trusted a Goa'uld.

But she was still curious. "Who were your fellow System Lords?"

"We were never System Lords," Aengus corrected her. His pale eyes held hers in the faint glow. "Not as Ra or Apophis or Heru'ur or Yu. In the larger scheme of things, we were minor Lords, commanders of mere thousands. We tired of the fighting among our masters and defected to these systems, hoping we would not be found."

Interesting. So the Goa'uld didn't all desire domination. Maybe some of the lesser Goa'uld Lords could be persuaded to rebel, weakening their masters. Sam filed that away for future reference.

"Who were they? The others."

 "Lir, Dana, Fionn, Rhianna, Aoife, and Midir." The names were recited off like a shopping list - all but the last one. There the music of his voice fell heavy and flat.

"Midir was the one whose slave you stole."

His eyes ignited, not in the glow of Goa'uld possession, but in anger. "You came of your own free will, Etain. And Fuamnach was wroth with both you and Midir. You came to me for protection and comfort. You trusted me." He took a step closer to her, standing on the other side of the shielding. The intensity of his gaze was fiercer than the glare of any madman. "You trusted me."

And, looking into his eyes, Sam found that she did, indeed, trust him.

It was both a frightening thought and an exhilarating one.

Her hand came up, skimming what she thought might be the edge of the field. It was faint and fragile as starlight, but she could feel the power humming through it as her palm came in contact with the edge of the shield.

If what he said was true and the shield was keyed to his body chemistry, then she should be able to pass in and out of the shield. Even just dip her finger...

The tip of one finger dipped into the barrier area – and she felt the field vibrating around her. Gradually withdrawing her finger from the shield, she examined it.

"I told you it was possible for you to pass in and out of the field."

"How did they do it?"

He laughed. "You always asked such questions, Etain! And I could not always answer them." The laughter died to a smile. "I do not know how they did it. Perhaps, in time, you will come to understand it."

Bolder now, Sam thrust her hand into the tingling sensation of the field, through to the other side. There was almost no resistance – it wasn't even like stepping into the event horizon of the Stargate. And if she took one step forward between the two stones...

She met Aengus's eyes.

And then someone cried out her name.

It swept through her on the night air like a compulsion, turning her away from the circle's interior. Her hand fell back to her side.

The next minute, she was being dragged back from the edge of the circle with unkind hands. "What the hell did you think you're doing, Major?" She caught a brief image of the Colonel, dark eyes roused, face set in harsh lines of anger. She stared at him, frowning at the rumpled look of his hair in the sudden brilliant blaze of light that blinded them both.

"S...sir?"

"I asked you what the hell you thought you were doing!" He waved a hand behind her.

Sam turned and gaped.

The circle was dark.

*

Continued in Trilithons Part Four - Sam


	4. Sam

**Trilithons – Part Four** **Sam**

Daniel's restlessness dissipated as Sam stumbled into the campsite looking shaken. "Sam!"

Jack stalked in behind her as Daniel stared at them both, and Teal'c opened his eyes from his meditations and got to his feet as Sam sat down on a log. A more accurate term – at least to Daniel's thinking – was 'collapsed'. She went from standing to sitting almost without transition. "Sam?" He glanced at Jack, guessing that the other man's anger at finding Sam gone from the camp had translated into a very unsympathetic commanding officer on the walk back.

"Found her at the stones. It looked like she was talking to someone."

"Aengus?"

"I dunno. You tell me, Daniel." Down on the log, Sam had put her head in her hands, raking her hands through her hair – almost as if she had a headache. "Carter!"

Her head jerked up as if someone had electrified her. "Sir?" She glanced around at her team-mates, standing up around her. "What are you guys doing awake?" She looked over at Daniel, surprised. "Daniel, I was going to wake you..."

She seemed disoriented rather than defensive – like someone awakening woozy from anaesthesia. Warning bells started going off in Daniel's head.

He hunkered down beside her, glancing up at Jack's irritated expression. "Sam, what do you remember?"

The gaze that met his was measuring and he saw the wariness in her eyes as she processed his question and what it might mean. "I was on the watch and..." Her eyes widened. "I was...talking...with someone. With...Aengus?" Then she jerked as if her mind had only just kicked into gear. "He's still here! They didn't bury him...he's still...but how does that work?"

Daniel had a moment for a brief smile - in spite of her shock, Sam's essential instincts remained the same. As Jack had very recently pointed out, any question beginning with a 'How...?' was a dangerous one around Sam.

His thoughts skipped ahead of hers. There was only one place for someone to live in that circle. "The stones are in a circular formation, Sam. Maybe there's a ring transporter in there as well. He lives beneath the ground by day, and can come above ground by night when the stones 'operate'." It wasn't a very good description, but given that he'd woken up half an hour ago, found Sam missing, and panicked, it would do. He looked to Jack, "What was she doing?"

"'She' is right here, Daniel." Sam spoke with renewed asperity. Daniel didn't even have to look at her to know she was glaring at him.

"She was trying to get into the circle," Jack told them. "Dunno if it was of her own free will or if he had hooks in her..."

Sam opened her mouth, then shut it again. She looked surprised. "I tried to get into the circle?"

"Yeah. There was some glowy light thing happening when I came over the hill but when I got to you and pulled you round there was a bright flash and the circle was dark again." 

"Ring transports." Daniel couldn't keep the satisfaction of a correct assessment out of his voice.

"Whatever." Jack's voice was marginally above a growl. Whether or not he'd taken Sam to task for her actions, he was still angry with her. Understandably so. "So, Carter, now that you're actually awake, would you care to enlighten us as to why you're wandering around – during your watch, no less."

She looked blankly at Jack, then swivelled her gaze to Daniel and Teal'c. "I... I don't know, sir. I don't remember. One moment I was here at the camp thinking that I needed to...uh...relieve myself. Next minute...I..." She turned back to Jack, dark-shadowed eyes seeking a confirmation of her actions. "I was at the stones?"

"You were on the verge of walking into the glowing circle, Carter. If I hadn't turned up, you'd probably be in the Goa'uld's clutches right now."

One hand rose to her head, pressing against the temple. "Damn. I'm sorry, sir. I don't know _what I was thinking..."_

"Yeah? Join the club."

Daniel was only half-listening to the conversation between his team-mates. Something had caught his attention. _Aengus... Aengus... What aspect did he represent in the Irish pantheon...?_

It suddenly clicked. "Love." His team-mates stared at him at the non-sequitur of his statement. "Aengus was the Irish god of love and youth."

Their bewilderment continued unabated. "So?" Jack asked.

"So we've already encountered a Goa'uld posing as the god of love." Still no recognition in their eyes, so Daniel gave them another hint. "More accurately, the _goddess_ of love."

"Hathor," Sam said, understanding dawning in her eyes.

"Hathor was able to bewitch the men in the SGC," Teal'c noted, lifting his head in curiosity. "As the god of love, Aengus may possess a similar effect on women."

They stared at each other, digesting these thoughts.

"So Carter's a liability as long as we're on this planet?"

Daniel winced at Jack's blunt depiction of the situation. It wasn't how he'd have described it, but it was accurate enough. "In terms of the fact that she's a woman, yes."

Sam was staring down at her hands, frowning slightly. Her gaze flickered up to meet Daniel's and she smiled slightly – more of a wince than a smile - then looked away.

"Okay, so how come SG-9 didn't have this problem." Jack interrupted just as he was about to ask Sam if everything was okay. "They've got at least one female member, don't they?"

"Not for this mission, they didn't," Daniel interjected, remembering the initial report he'd read. "Lieutenant Palmer was down with the flu, and Lieutenant Norris took her place during the initial survey. So when they came here, SG-9 was an all-male team." 

"Could he have any influence on us?"

Daniel looked to Sam. Normally he would have expected some kind of reaction or response from her, but she said nothing.

He took up the thread. "Given that you, Teal'c and I are okay, and that SG-9 made it out in one piece, I think it's fairly safe to say that it only works on women."

Jack nodded, presumably thinking that it was one less thing to worry about. "Okay, so he ensnares Carter. Presumably against her will..."

"Definitely against her will," Sam muttered. She sounded irritated, but there was a dark humour to her voice. She might not like the idea that she was in the thrall of this Goa'uld, but at least she was taking it in her stride.

"...what next? What does he want her for?"

Daniel looked to Sam. "Sam?"

She stared back at him, her face growing pale as a memory intruded. "He called me 'Etain'," she remembered, meeting Daniel's eyes. "Not just tonight but last night as well."

"Last night?" Jack interrupted, alarmed now. "You mean tonight wasn't the only night..."

"O'Neill..."

"Jack..."

"Sir." Sam's voice cut through both Daniel and Teal'c's protests. 

"Okay, okay. You didn't know he was doing it. Doesn't mean that it's not a worry!" Jack threw up his hands, raking one of them through his hair. "Okay, so he's having a bad case of mistaken identity in you...what about it? What comes next?"

"Etain was the slave Aengus stole from the other Goa'uld. Maybe Sam's his Etain."

"She's not." Jack sat down on his own log. There was a smug finality about his attitude and Daniel restrained the urge to roll his eyes. 

"Well, maybe _he thinks she is."_

"Okay, so we have a Goa'uld who's fixated on some slave he got imprisoned for however many thousands of years ago, then Carter comes along and he decides that she'll do in a pinch." Jack glanced sideways at Sam. "No offence, Carter."

Her lips curved faintly in a wry smile. "None taken, sir." She'd moved beyond her behaviour of earlier this evening and was now ready to work through the ramifications.

"So, what now?" Daniel asked. "Abandon the mission?" It wasn't a prospect he cherished, but it might be necessary. They had the inscriptions on video camera and translations could be made from them, but it would be out of the question to continue with the astronomical calculations Jack had been doing, and the same would go for Sam's work with the huge slabs, their composition and properties.

"I do not believe that will be necessary, Daniel Jackson. It appears that Major Carter is susceptible to this Goa'uld. However we are not."

The idea had its merits, but even so... "You're saying we should take Sam back?" Something in him objected to the idea of just 'discarding' Sam for the remainder of this mission. All for one and one for all, after all.

Jack turned to Sam. "Carter? What's your take on this?"

Her unhappiness about the situation was plain to see, but she made the choice Daniel had expected - the only choice she really _could_ make. "Sir, I'd rather not go back. But if this Goa'uld has the same effect on women that Hathor had on men... You pretty much said it yourself, sir. I'm a liability. You guys don't have to leave," there was a brief resentful resignation in her voice as she admitted that, "I do." 

Daniel was both relieved and regretful. On one hand, they wouldn't have to pack it all up. On the other hand, it would mean that Sam would have to wait back at the SGC until the analyses were done, and Daniel had hoped to have her around so he could bounce ideas with her.

As it was, she was taking the news pretty well.

A thought occurred to him. "Would taking her through to the SGC do it? How do we know she's not...I don't know...like a za'tarc?"

"Daniel, don't complicate things. Wouldn't he have to...I don't know, get a link to her brain to make her a zanax?"

"Za'tarc, Jack."

"Whatever."

"Well, how does the za'tarc-ing work? Did the Tok'ra ever explain that?"

"You're asking _me? Carter?"_

"The Tok'ra never fully explained the process by which a person became a za'tarc agent. I don't think they knew it themselves – and they refused me access to the notes on...on za'tarc technology." For a moment, she looked distressed, then she relaxed again. "I don't know sir."

"Okay, Carter, what do you remember about him? What did he ask you?" 

"I'm not sure, sir. Speaking with him is...blurry."

"Blurry?"

She looked over at him. "Like a distant memory."

"All right, so what exactly is in these 'distant memories'?"

There was a note of uncertainty in her voice as she described the bits and pieces that she recalled from her memory. Very little of it was worth worrying about - Aengus appeared to be fixated on her as Etain rather than as a potential resource. It suggested that the Goa'uld in question was oriented almost solely towards regaining his lost love rather than the usual pursuits of galactic domination and power. Of course, that didn't mean that the Goa'uld _wouldn't_ eventually use her in that manner if she were left with him.

Best not to tempt fate at all.

Jack evidently thought the same because after a minute he held up his hands in silent request for her to stop. "Okay, I don't think there's too much to worry about – after all, he didn't manage to get a hold of you in person. We'll send you home and keep and get Janet to check you out – there's no point in trying to second-guess ourselves." Jack glanced around, meeting everyone's eyes in the darkness. When he found no other resistance, he nodded in their direction. "Right, I want Teal'c and Daniel to keep an eye on the camp while I get Carter back to the Stargate and see her through. That Goa'uld can't get out of the circle, right?"

Daniel spread his hands out in a gesture of uncertainty. "I don't know - it's just a theory, Jack."

"He can't," Sam said, looking from Daniel to Jack. "He's trapped inside the circle. I got the impression that he's sent below ground during the day and can only come outside at night."

"Which is why we've never seen him during the day... Jack, I think we should learn everything we can about Aengus before we send Sam back. Most of what we know about him is based on a couple of legends and a lot of assumptions." He turned back to Sam. "Are you up to answering questions?"

"I think so."

"Daniel, I'd like to have her out of his reach before dawn. It took us six hours to get here - we've only got about another four before the sun rises."

"Uh, sir, that was because we couldn't take the shorter route with the FRED in tow. Since we won't have the FRED, it'll only take two hours to the gate."

Jack glanced at his watch. "That's still a couple of hours."

"I can ask them on the way back to the Stargate," Daniel added. "So we don't lose any time."

"I haven't said you can come with, yet."

"Did you have a problem with finding out more information?"

"No, but I'd rather you kept an eye on things here at camp."

"Jack..."

"Daniel." 

"Don't you want to know what this Goa'uld is capable of?"

"Yes, but I'd rather have you and Teal'c hold the camp down. And believe it or not, _I_ can ask intelligent questions too!"

Daniel rolled his eyes. It seemed that Jack had the bit in his mouth and was going to take it for a run. He could go head-to-head or he could back down.

Right now, he was too tired to be bothered going head-to-head. And Jack would have a good idea of the questions to ask regarding their security and the security of Earth - even if he wouldn't ask the cultural ones that Daniel was interested in.

Which opened up another possibility - communicating with the Goa'uld.

If Aengus was safely confined in that circle, it might be possible to communicate with him - maybe learn new things about the Goa'uld. An exchange of knowledge? The promise of freedom?

The only question was what that freedom might entail.

In the back of his mind was the freedom they'd given Nirrti in exchange for Cassie's life.

It was something to think about anyway.

Seeing that Daniel wasn't about to argue, Jack got to his feet as he started sorting out his plans. "Okay. Grab your pack, Carter, we'll head back to the gate now. I want you off this planet before the sun comes up." He paused halfway across the campsite and turned back, a little sheepish at the tactlessness of his phrasing. "I didn't mean that quite the way it sounded."

A short, wry laugh punctuated her understanding. "I know, sir." Slowly hauling herself up, she went off in the direction of the tent she shared with Daniel.

"You sure about this, Jack?" Daniel asked quietly.

"I don't like it. But yeah, I'm sure. She was on the border of walking into the Stonehenge thing. And it was glowing. God only knows what would have happened once she got in there." Jack looked from Daniel to Teal'c. "In fact, I'm not happy about staying here at all. I'd rather we got away from here immediately. We only suspect that this Goa'uld only has power over women. I'd rather not stay around and discover that we're just as susceptible as Carter."

"We could get information out of this Goa'uld. We've never met one who was in a position where he couldn't touch us but we could still communicate."

"Daniel, I don't know that we _want to be in such a position. Besides, the only thing we have that he wants is Carter. Unless you're suggesting we trade Carter for information..."_

"I've already been traded once for a gun," Sam said, emerging from the still-shadowy corners of the camp. "Information is probably only marginally better."

"Or we could avoid trading you at _all," Jack said with the tones of someone who thought that was the most sensible idea so far._

"I admit to liking that option best, sir." She smiled. "Are we going soon?"

"Right now. Gimme a moment to get my pack." Jack vanished to his corner of the camp. 

They stood around in an uncomfortable moment before Teal'c asked, "Are there any specific details of the site that you would wish me to record, Major Carter?"

"Oh!" She seemed surprised by the courtesy Teal'c's request. "I do...but they're probably too many and a bit complex to just give them to you right now. What I can do is write them down on my way to the gate – it'll be a couple of hours' walk back – and I'll give them to the Colonel. Is that okay?"

Teal'c inclined his head in assent, and Daniel took the moment to ask, "Are you okay with this?" He was feeling a little guilty about having her go back while the rest of them stayed behind.

"No, Daniel," she sighed. "I'm not. But between taking the opportunity to study the stones and their properties – to say nothing of how the Goa'uld managed to get me to meet him and then wipe my memory of everything but the vaguest recollection of the meeting – and ending up as his prisoner..." Sam grimaced but shouldered her pack. "It's not much of a choice."

Jack emerged with his pack. "Right guys, hold down the fort, and I'll be back in about six hours."

"'Smoke me a kipper, I'll be back for breakfast,'" Daniel quoted, mischievously. He doubted that Jack would get the reference, but it was funny - or maybe just early. "Take care, Sam."

She shot him and Teal'c a half-smile and followed after Jack, the lights on their P-90s illuminating the dark night stretching out before them.

They watched them vanish into the night.

*

_Once again, they had taken her away. The one born of Fionn had come and removed her, and Aengus had activated the ring transporters to descend beneath the surface and ponder what he could do._

_He had been right, at least, the Fionn-born had too much independence and spirit to submit to Aengus. And if the Fionn-born was the leader of them as he seemed to be, then it was unlikely that the others would bend._

_But he'd had time with Etain. Time to know her, to learn of her. Time to influence her as only he out of all his brethren could. And she would not leave him. She loved him. She had come to him, running from the jealousy of Fuamnach and seeking sanctuary with him._

_And he had given her sanctuary – and more. He had given her everything that he was._

_And he would not lose it again._

_Up on the surface again, he turned to the distant, greying sky where the Chappa'ai stood._

_He called her._

_She would answer him. _

*

_Headache. Hard ground. Hard _wet_ ground. What am I... Memory returned, bringing pain along with it. Jack sat up and immediately wished he hadn't. __Dammit, Carter!_

They'd been walking for about half an hour when she began slipping behind, claiming tiredness. She looked pretty exhausted. Four hours of sleep, another couple of hours of being on watch, and thirty minutes of walking through the almost-pitch black wasn't easy on the body. Up until that moment Jack hadn't seen any odd behaviour by her, so he eased up the pace, walking a little slower. She dropped behind a step or two, then everything blacked out.

Damn Goa'uld must have had a stronger hold on her than they realised.

He checked his watch. He'd lost at least forty-five minutes of time – she was probably back at the stones by now. Time to call in the cavalry.

Jack clicked his radio. "Teal'c? Daniel?"

After a moment, Teal'c's voice came, sleepy and surprised. "O'Neill?"

"Carter made a break for it. Guess the Goa'uld did have something programmed into her."

"She will go directly to the circle, O'Neill."

"Yeah. Look, Teal'c, I want you and Daniel to head for the Stones – you should be immune to anything the Goa'uld tries on you. Keep an eye on Daniel. It might be just Carter, it might not, but I'm not taking risks. I'll meet you there in about thirty."

"Very well, O'Neill."

Bones creaked alarmingly as Jack hauled himself to his feet and trotted back the way they'd come. He was getting much, much too old for this kind of running around. Technically, he should have been flying a desk by this time – it was only by the grace of Hammond that he wasn't. That, and because the Air Force probably didn't have a lot for him to do if he wasn't in the field. Training cadets to deal with offworld situations, maybe, but again with the oldness and the aches.

His old bones were really aching – especially the knees. Jack kept jogging driving himself onwards.

There wasn't a lot of time before dawn, and Daniel had theorised that the ring transporters wouldn't work during the daylight hours. And the idea of her in the hands of a Goa'uld who thought she was his lost love for a full sixteen hours of daylight...

It didn't bear thinking about, so Jack didn't think about it. Instead, he gritted his teeth and kept running.

She'd been a little quiet as they left the camp. He'd asked a few questions and her answers were subdued. It wasn't usual for her, but he'd waved it away as shell-shock that the Goa'uld had managed to get subliminal hook in so deeply. He should have looked harder and not just accepted that she was okay.

_Hindsight is always perfect_.

He ran over the last hill and down towards the camp, then veered off down in the direction of the stonehenge.

It was glowing.

As Jack drew closer, he could see the two dark shadows before the faint light of the circle of stones. Standing. Doing nothing.

Logic told him they wouldn't have been doing nothing unless there was nothing _to_ do.

_Damn. Too late._

"Guys?"

"No sign of them," Daniel said as he turned to Jack. "But there's nowhere else she could be... Are you sure she came back here and didn't run somewhere else?"

Jack rubbed his neck. "No, I don't know. She knocked me out and I only came to twenty minutes ago."

"How long were you out?"

"At least half an hour – maybe closer to forty-five minutes..."

"Major Carter has had more than enough time to return to this place." Teal'c turned his face back to the faint glow of the whatever-it-was that hummed on the edge of their hearing.

Jack gritted his teeth. He didn't like this. He didn't like it at all. Under normal circumstances, she'd never have broken like that. She'd never have hit him either – striking a superior officer was a court-martiallable offence.

These weren't normal circumstances, any more than the men of the SGC allowing a Goa'uld to take over the installation were normal circumstances. He'd cut her slack when they got her out of there.

Some slack, anyway.

"You haven't gone in, yet?"

"Haven't dared to," Daniel admitted. "It crossed my mind, but I don't know how much of what Sam told us was the truth and how much of it was spun to her by Aengus. She said it was attuned to his body chemistry..."

Jack looked over at Teal'c and shrugged as he stepped up to the shield. He doubted that this was going to be fun – but he didn't really have a choice.

From a purely military standpoint, Carter was a liability with all the knowledge she possessed about the SGC, it's technology, it's allies and with the fragments of Jolinar still in her head; leaving her in the hands of the Goa'uld would be one of the biggest tactical mistakes since they sent Apophis (allegedly dead) back through the wormhole to Sokar.

From a personal standpoint, she was among the closest people to Jack, a neverending source of amazement, someone who knew where he was coming from – even if she didn't fully understand it, and a good friend. He'd be damned before he left her in the hands of a Goa'uld, infatuated or not.

The shield didn't tingle, didn't hum. It felt like he was thrusting his hand into something that had the texture molasses - but no stickiness. He pulled his hand back and stared at it, studying it.

"You're going in?" Daniel sounded worried and Jack felt a spark of anger.

"Unless you want to leave Carter in there?"

"Wouldn't Teal'c be better? At least we know he's not open to Goa'uld..." A humming sound interrupted him: transporter rings.

Jack had his P-90 up and pointed even as the rings rose out of the ground in the circle. At the same time, he heard the sizzle of a staff weapon being prepped. They were as ready as they could be for whatever the Goa'uld was going to throw at them.

As the dazzling light faded and the darkness swept in once again, two figures became distinguishable from the dark surroundings.

Carter. Carter watching them serenely from inside the circle. And a man who stood at her shoulder, the colour leached from his skin so he looked unearthly and pale. By contrast, his hair was like fire, even in the eerie blue light of the stones.

Aengus. 

"You intrude."

So. No small-talk, then. "You've got our team-mate."

"She came of her own free will."

Jack snorted in disbelief, "You expect us to believe that?"__

"What my colleague is trying to say," Daniel interjected with a warning glance at Jack, "Is that Sam is very unlikely to have gone to you if she wasn't drugged."

"Etain has known me through the ages, and I have known her. I have waited for her and she has returned to me."

Damned smug Goa'uld.

He ignored Daniel's attempt to keep him quiet. "Or you just took advantage of the fact that she's the first female to arrive on the planet in a couple of thousand years and thought you'd jump her."

The Goa'uld's eyes – a pale, watery ice-blue – narrowed at Jack. "I am not so indiscriminate, son of Fionn. Etain is my mate as she has been since Fuamnach's wrath fell upon her in the household of my brother and she fled."

Jack had no idea what the creature was talking about. Jack didn't give a damn what the creature was talking about - he wasn't about to lose her to this mook. "Yeah, whatever. Look, I'll do a deal. You let her back through here, we'll walk out of here and never come back. You can have your nice misty planet all to yourself again."

Of course there was no way the Goa'uld was going to say 'Hey, sure, no problem. Get out there, 'Etain' and go back to your life before I decided I wanted a partner and the first available woman came along.'

"I care not for your presence or the presence of your companions. Etain is here with me, and here she will remain."

Of course.

"Carter?" There wasn't any point in further trying to argue with the Goa'uld. It wasn't about to give her up, so it would be up to her to get up and get out of there - and up to Jack to persuade her to get out of there.

She looked at him, expression still mostly serene, although it seemed she was trying to frown. "Sir?"

"Come out of there now." He resisted the urge to add, 'Before we have to come in and fetch you!'

"With all due respect, sir... No."

"This isn't like you, Carter." Jack held her gaze, trying to get through whatever illusion the creature had put on her. "This isn't like you at all."

"Maybe you don't know me, then."

Aengus had turned to her, brushing strands of hair back from her ear, taking her hand in its own. Jack ground his teeth and tried again. "Carter, I know that somewhere inside you, you're trying to fight this guy. Remember Hathor? You kicked her ass when she tried this routine on us. You're a fighter, Carter, always were. Fight it, dammit!"

She blinked and, for a moment, they saw something flit across her face – terror, anguish, revulsion, sorrow – before it settled back into the calm and cool expression of the woman who didn't care.

The Goa'uld brushed its mouth across her jaw. "As you see, she is mine." It shifted, half-blocking their view of her, although Jack could see the hand that slipped under her jacket, curving about her waist.

_Fuck_.

"You'll never own her completely," Daniel said clearly into the circle. "A part of her struggles to be free..."

It turned, pale eyes burning in a livid expression. "And what kind of life would you have her lead? One in which she grows old, unloved? Her destiny belongs with me – the men who desire her are cursed to destruction!" Jack noted that the Goa'uld still held her hand, but that her other hand – her free hand – twitched a little, as if she were struggling against whatever coercions the creature had put on her. Aengus's face contorted with rage. "Who would claim her from me? Will you tell me that her heart belongs to any of you?" There was no mistaking the insult in its voice as it looked at each man; there was no mistaking the challenge in its stance.

Jack hardly heard the question. he was holding her eyes as if her life depended on the force of his will as transmitted through their locked gazes. _Come on, Carter. Don't you dare give in. Fight it. Whatever he's doing to you, fight it!_

For a moment there was only the faintest whispering of the wind through the leaves of the forest, then Aengus' expression eased to exultation. "No? Then she remains."

And he turned his back on them – turned his attentions back to her.

Jack saw red. A desperate blend of fear and fury rushed through him and gave rise to the knife-sharp edge in his voice. He was _not_ going to lose her. "Carter! Get your sorry butt out here right this instant! If you don't come out of there immediately, then you're up for dereliction of duty and I will _not be impressed!"_

They saw her freeze; saw her hands come up and push the Goa'uld away; saw him catch her arm. "You swore to me there was no other, Etain!" She winced under the pressure of his fingers around her forearm. "You are mine, and I will _not_ let you go!"

Jack felt a moment of triumph that she'd fought the creature. If she could fight it once, then she could fight it again. "I think we're at a standoff," he said conversationally. "Because we're not going to let her go if we have to blow this place to hell."

And he would. He would have to, because Jack couldn't leave her in the hands of the Goa'uld. He wouldn't leave her knowledge – he wouldn't leave _her_ – in the hands of someone who only wanted her for her resemblance to a long-dead slave.

For one, it went against all his training; for two, it went against all his instincts; and for three, she deserved so much better than that – and Jack knew it.

"You seek that which no longer exists," Teal'c said, his voice deep and clear in the night. "Major Carter is not the slave Etain."

Aengus looked up, and the intensity of hatred on his face was so strong, they instinctively took a step back. "Etain is _mine_," he all but snarled, more animal than Lord. "She belongs to _me_."

In the end, that was all she was to it, Jack saw. An object of possession. True Goa'uld nature coming out, plain and clear.

_Over my dead body._

"Will the choice be hers to make?" Daniel challenged the Goa'uld, "Or will it be made by you?" Daniel had straightened his shoulders from their usual slight hunch, his chin was up, and his gaze never left Aengus'. "Give her the choice, Aengus. Let her choose if she'll stay or go."

It paused, thinking over Daniel's words. They waited. Then the Goa'uld shifted, and Jack could see the outright rejection of the idea before it began to speak.

He ignored whatever the creature was going to say, appealing to the person in the circle he knew he could reach. "Carter!" _Come on, Carter. Where's that stubbornness of yours?_

And she moved.

Her hand tightened on Aengus' arm and she swung it around, tipping it off balance. Then she ran for the opening between the stones.

She nearly didn't make it. The Goa'uld was fast.

It was up in a split-second, grasping futilely after her.

Jack thrust his arms inside the shield, reaching for her hands to help yank her through. He seized one arm of her fatigues, the warm solidity of her flesh through the jacket a comforting sensation.

It wasn't until much later that he realised if he hadn't reached in and grabbed her, she'd never have gotten out.

Whatever was keeping the Goa'uld in there reacted to her body contacting it. The glow of the stones dimmed briefly – like a brown-out – and there was a sudden resistance to her passage through the shield. She cried out, her face contorting in brief agony, and Jack pulled at her with all his strength even though her scream tore at him. His other hand plunged through the field to grip the edge of her jacket...

And then she was through. The resistance of the shield was gone, and they stumbled backwards until Jack's heel caught on the dew-damp grass and they fell.

She didn't quite land on top of him but the collapse winded them both. A single quiet moment passed with only the thundering of his heart running overtime on adrenaline, and the panting sound of her breathing.

Then the Goa'uld howled.

It was an utterly inhuman cry of despair and pain, resonating deep in the bone and raising hairs on the back of his neck. Jack shivered and grabbed for her arm as she rolled off him. Considering how she'd run off before, he wasn't going to give the Goa'uld a second chance at keeping her.

She glanced at him, but didn't protest. Her gaze was dragged back to the now-silent Aengus, standing inside the edge of the inner circle of stones.

Teal'c knelt beside them, "Are you well, Major Carter?" His eyes ranged swiftly over her from head to toe, making a careful note of her state.

"Yeah. I'm fine, Teal'c. I think." She glanced up at Daniel who'd taken slow steps backwards, never turning his back on the Goa'uld glaring out from the circle.

Staring at Carter, who was looking back at him. 

His grip tightened on her arm. "Carter..."

"It's alright, sir." 

Slowly, she stood up, Jack matching his movements with hers and never letting go of her arm. She took one step forward, and Teal'c interposed himself between her and the Goa'uld and Jack's grip on her tightened to the point of pain. She winced and he eased his tense fingers a little as she looked over at him, a question in her eyes that he answered with a look. _You're not going anywhere, Carter. Certainly nowhere near him._

She nodded and held her ground.

Teal'c moved away, still facing her and staying between her and the stones so he could stop her if she tried to return to the Goa'uld.

"Aengus."

"Etain."

"Sam," she corrected it. "I'm not Etain, Aengus." And if there was a note of regret in her voice as she said it, Jack didn't care. He had her and the Goa'uld didn't. "I never was."

And with that, she turned towards the camp and began walking away, the rest of her team following after her.

*

Continued in Trilithons Part Five - Absolution


	5. Absolution

**Trilithons – Absolution**

The stumble back to the Stargate was difficult in the pre-dawn light, even for Teal'c.

It must have been nightmarish for Major Carter.

She was just ahead of him in the misty rain, flanked by Daniel Jackson. O'Neill lead the way a few steps ahead of them as Teal'c acted as a kind of rearguard. From Major Carter's faltering gait it was clear that she was exhausted, but she pressed on without uttering any complaint.

They were all uncomfortable; tired from the run, and damp from the mist-like rain that had begun floating down from the sky as they returned to the camp.

O'Neill had wished to evacuate Major Carter from the planet at the first available opportunity and SG-1 set out from the camp almost as soon as they arrived back there. They took their packs – all, save Major Carter's pack. Hers had been lost when she had run from O'Neill during the first attempt to return her to the SGC, although whether she lost it during her flight back to the circle or during her time beneath the circle was uncertain. She wouldn't speak about anything from the time she had knocked O'Neill out to the time when she appeared in the circle alongside Aengus.

Daniel Jackson was evidently dismayed by her reticence, but he had trotted alongside her for most of the journey, trying to bring her out of her shell. So far, from what Teal'c had seen and overheard, she had refused all Daniel Jackson's attempts to draw her out.

Ahead of them all, O'Neill was point. It had not been explicitly stated by their leader that they would range themselves around Major Carter to prevent another escape, however Teal'c had understood O'Neill's intention almost immediately, and Daniel Jackson took only a little time to work it out for himself. No words were said, they fell into their 'positions' easily. Such fluid actions would have been the same if it had been any of them incapacitated by circumstance.

In addition to these precautions, Major Carter wore restraints around her wrists to further hinder any attempts to return back to the stones. Aware of the risk she presented to her team-mates, Major Carter had submitted to being put under restraint, although she was visibly unhappy about it.

O'Neill had fixed them around her wrists, tight enough that they couldn't be easily undone, loose enough that her circulation was not cut off, and far enough apart so she wasn't completely uncomfortable while walking. He was taking no chances this time around.

His friend was not angry, Teal'c sensed. Instead, O'Neill hid his concerns and his worries behind a gruff face and curt orders. There had been many times when Teal'c had also been required to hide his emotions behind the expression of a commander. The situation required all his skill and his patience with none to spare for emotion, and so it was cast aside and blocked off from thought.

Ahead of Teal'c, Daniel Jackson and Major Carter began scrambling up a rocky outcropping. The rock was sheened with the dew, and halfway up, Major Carter stumbled and slid down the rockface. Her hands, confined in the restraints, couldn't find suitable purchase on the stone and it was only Teal'c's presence behind her that stopped her slide down the slope.

Daniel Jackson was down beside her in an instant, with O'Neill a second behind.

"Carter?"

She gritted her teeth, where she'd come to sit on the loosened dirt of the slope. She'd turned her hands over to examine the scraped on them. "I'm okay, sir."

"Your hands are scratched." Teal'c observed and she quickly flipped her hands over, clasping them together.

"They'll be okay," she repeated.

"I think she's tired."

"She _is tired," Major Carter said with unaccustomed fierceness to Daniel Jackson. "She's especially tired of being talked about as if she wasn't here!"_

Daniel Jackson's expression grew a little disconcerted at the snap, but he kept silent. Instead it was O'Neill who spoke.

"Do you want to rest, Carter?"

A shake of the head indicated her answer as she climbed slowly to her feet, shunning both O'Neill and Daniel Jackson's offers of assistance. "I can keep going, sir."

O'Neill looked carefully at her for a long moment and she returned the gaze, almost defiantly. Then he nodded, his expression neutral. "Daniel, take point. Teal'c..."

"I shall walk beside Major Carter." Teal'c interrupted O'Neill's arrangement of their positions. While he had no doubt that O'Neill had only Major Carter's best interests in mind, her state would not be improved by the kind of pep talk his team-mate had to give her.

"O-kay. Then it looks like I'm rearguard." With another hard look at Major Carter. O'Neill stepped back and waited for Teal'c and Major Carter to  move on before following in their trail.

She sighed as they set off again, a barely-perceptible huff of air in the hazy dawn mists to express her irritation with her team-mates and her frustration at her own circumstances.

Teal'c assisted Major Carter to the top of the rock and kept a careful eye on her all the way down the other side.

It wasn't until a klick later that Teal'c felt comfortable about speaking to his team-mate of the thoughts that preyed upon her mind. They were on a stretch of lush green meadow before the hill that would take them into the valley where the Stargate stood, so her attention was not needed from her terrain and would be better served away from her thoughts of depression. "Major Carter?"

"Teal'c?"

"Do you blame me for succumbing to the will of Apophis on the mothership outside Vorash?" He knew the answer, and so did she.

She looked at him, puzzled. "No." 

He nodded once. "Do you blame Daniel Jackson and O'Neill for succumbing to Hathor's lures?" In front of them, Daniel Jackson turned a little, eyebrows rose in query before he turned back and kept walking.

The shake of her head was emphatic. "No. Of course not."

"Then why do you now insist on blaming yourself for your weakness to Aengus' attraction?"

Her expression was gratifying: the guilt and confusion of her self-judgement plain even in the crepuscular, pre-dawn light. "This was different," she said.

"How?"

For all that Teal'c admired his team-mate's skills as a warrior and as a scholar, there were times when she was very short sighted regarding her own weaknesses and what she could do to mitigate them. The Goa'uld were not gods, but they had the power of gods in their hands with the technology they held.

"It just...is."

It wasn't, but Teal'c said no more. Major Carter would come to the conclusion he wished her to reach: that while she might hold herself responsible for what had happened, her team-mates did not. The seeds of forgiveness and self-acceptance were planted in her mind. They would bear fruit in time.

They walked on to the Stargate.

*

_He paced in the circle of stones that kept him from her, anger and jealousy burning within him._

_She had left him! After all he had done, after everything he had worked on her mind and on her body, she had _run_ from him as if he were a monster and not her lover._

_The men who had challenged him were nothing to her. Aengus was a thousand times more than they..._

_His hands clenched as he remembered the taste of her, the feel of her. She'd been so soft, willingly accepting his embrace in the chamber below as he'd bound her to him in yet another fashion apart from the glamour that surrounded her._

_Yet neither glamour nor physical intimacy had prevailed upon her to remain with him..._

_Aengus slammed his fists against the nearby stone and screamed his anguish to the pale sky of dawn as the rings consigned him back to his eternal prison._

_Etain was gone._

_He was alone._

*

It carried to them on the frigid morning air.

The utterly inhuman howl of the Goa'uld sent a shudder down Jack's spine and made him swivel on his heels towards the noise.

Behind him, she made an odd noise and he turned to find her standing rigid in the crisp morning air.

Instinctively, he caught her arm and felt her shiver and relax. "Carter?"

"I'm okay now, sir." She was still subdued, even after Teal'c had questioned her about her behaviour in comparison to their own at various times through the years. Jack had to give Teal'c credit; the man knew how to get at the nooks and crannies of her prison of self-flagellation.

Jack didn't question her assurances, not here. Once they were back in the SGC, he might, but the priority was to get her back home before anything more happened.

The assumption that the ring transporters only worked in darkness wasn't enough for Jack's comfort, even in the faint shafts of morning sunlight diffusing their way through the fog.

He turned to Daniel, standing frozen by the DHD staring up at the hills. "Dial it up, Daniel."

Daniel nodded, took a deep breath and began hitting the keys to dial the gate. She'd  turned away from the hills and was staring fixedly at the empty circle of the Stargate.

She'd retreated again, he saw. They'd drifted apart over the last couple of months - since her possession by the electrical entity. Their work together hadn't suffered, but their friendship had. And it had taken a couple of months for Jack to realise that she was drifting - from him, and probably also from Daniel and Teal'c. And that worried him. 

After the first night, he'd hoped he'd gotten through to her enough to start over again in building up the level of trust between them - personal trust, not professional. And it had seemed promising. But after the last couple of nights they were back to square one. Or maybe a negative square if there were such things possible.

His excuse for his curt behaviour of the last six hours was fear. A simple fear but a powerful one and motivated by equally powerful emotions.

And somehow he'd have to break through her reticence all over again.

He wasn't relishing the kind of effort it would take.

She glanced over at him, as if sensing his gaze on her. "Sir?"

"You know, you might get a medal for this."

_That_ caught her attention - if only in bewildered confusion. "Medal? For this?"

Jack grinned at her expression. They were close enough to the Stargate that he was in a better humour than he'd been for the last couple of hours, without the tension of her security preying so strongly on his mind. "Well the last time you hit a superior officer in the head, you got a commendation from Hammond. I figure that as your immediate superior, I should at least see you get a medal..." _For putting up with me for five years, if nothing else, he added in his head._

She stared at him incredulously for a moment before she gave a soft snorting laugh and flushed. Her gaze found her toes again, and she muttered, "I'm really sorry about that, sir, and I understand that you have to report it..."

"I probably should," he noted. "But I won't. It wasn't insubordination - just alien influence."

She glanced up at him to see his expression and not just hear his words, then hesitated as if she was about to say something. But after a moment her smile faded. She nodded just once before looking back at the Stargate and the now-erupting event horizon that settled to ripples of blue.

"Carter?" Jack asked. He truthfully expected whatever she'd been going to say was going to stay unsaid, but he had to ask.

He wasn't disappointed. "Sir?" All right. She wanted to play 'Little Miss Major', so be it.

"Never mind." No point in pushing her now. She'd only retreat and it would make things worse later. And there would definitely be a later. Jack turned to check that the iris code had been sent, and Daniel's wave indicated that it was clear to go. So he indicated the gate to her, keeping his hand curled around the inside of her arm. Just to be sure she didn't run off again.

Priority number one was to get her off the planet, and priority number two was to have her physical condition checked out by the Doc. Reassuring her would have to take a back seat – for the moment. He'd corner her later by whatever means were possible and make sure she wasn't locked into a cycle of self-recrimination. She was good at that. So was Jack. 

He had a pretty good idea of how she'd feel with the fast one Aengus had pulled over her - and he had a pretty good idea of how to deal with it. A good kick in the pants and she'd realise that she couldn't have done anything to stop Aengus while under his influence. She'd realise that she'd done an incredible job fighting it.

And maybe she'd even accept that not everything was under her control. Like the Ambassador and the situation with the Aschenn. Like the destruction of Tollana and Narim's death. Like the glowy alien guy and the NID. Like the entity. Like the death glider out past Jupiter. Like the situation on Apophis' ship.

But that would have to come later. Get her home first, then deal with her issues - and maybe a few of his own.

However, it seemed that while he'd decided to deal with her later, she'd decided to deal with him now. They'd only taken two steps forward when she spoke hesitantly. "Sir?"

Jack was surprised by the sudden willingness to talk but didn't look a gift horse in the mouth. "Yeah?"

He caught a brief glimpse of her eyes before she looked away, huge blue orbs in the planes of her face. 

She caught his gaze before her eyes slid away. "Thank you for...for coming back to get me." Her embarrassment was plain enough. "And for yelling at me while I was in the circle..."

Caught by surprise at the unexpected gratitude, Jack took a second to answer. "Uh...no problem, Carter. All in the job description." It was easy to make light of it. Too easy.

In some ways, that was typical of Sam Carter and anything that dug too deep into her emotions. Do the small 'reach-out' stuff now and hope that it would cover the big stuff later.

_And, yeah, I relate to that._

But Jack wouldn't be fooled by the small stuff - although it was certainly a start.

He'd still be checking up with her later.

Later.

They walked up the stairs, arm in arm, to go back home.

* The End *


End file.
